dominant harmony / minor tonality
cyber text for the theory of American music

dominant harmony / minor tonality

Five chord / dominant. Upon the fifth scale degree of the natural minor scale we create what theorists commonly term the dominant chord. The Five chord in the minor tonality is diatonically a minor triad, with the seventh added it becomes a what players call a minor seventh chord. Unlike the dominant chord in the major tonality, there is no tritone within the dominant chord which is diatonically created from the natural minor scale. This is one of the reasons for both the melodic and harmonic minor scales, both of which raise the seventh degree of the natural minor scale scale up by half step, providing the essential leading tone pitch for creating the tritone tension between the third and seventh degree of the Five 7 chord. With or without the tritone, the dominant chord is oftentimes still the key player in setting up the motion to return to the tonic, especially in the blues. Here is our folk melody using the dominant color. Example 6.

As with the major tonality, the three principle chords i.e., One, Four, Five, in the minor tonality are all tonally colored the same. Using this minor color creates some very earthy grooves, favored among folk, blues, rock and reggae / world beat musicians, all styles really. Here we flip around the common One / Four / Five to create a vamp or groove of Five / Four / to One, which when continuously cycled, has a powerful centering effect on both the players and dancers alike. Example 6a.

The all too common adjustment in the Five chord in the minor key is to make the minor seventh chord type into the dominant seventh chord type, to firm up the Five / One cadential motion within the minor tonality. This is simply done by raising the minor 3rd of the dominant triad up by half step. Raising the third in this manner adds the potential of the leading tone 7th. Click and compare the two cadential possibilities, in A minor. Example 6b.

The Five chord in measure 9 is diatonically created from the natural minor scale, which contains the sub tonic 7th as the 3rd of the minor Five chord, ( G natural ). The Five chord of measure 11 raises this sub tonic 7th to the leading tone or major 7th, ( from G to G# ). By using the leading tone seventh from either the melodic or harmonic minor scale configurations, our dominant chord in the minor tonality becomes a tritone containing dominant seventh chord. Compare the two cadences above. Bars 9 and 10 versus bars 11 and 12. What's your preference? Theoretically, they pretty much do the same thing. Resolve or release musical tension. Artistically, the first cadence is a bit of a softer hue than the second, as presented in example 3 above. So two easy and common choices in resolving the Five chord to One in the minor tonality. What about other color tones besides the seventh for dominant harmony? What's the church mode built on the 5th degree of the minor tonality?

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